Is the Seventh-Day Sabbath Still Binding?
By E. Hilliard
THE Sabbath was instituted at creation as a memorial of the work done by the Creator during the first week of time. He kept an accurate count of the days of that week, created man on the sixth day, rested on the seventh, and blessed and sanctified it. As long as the earth should remain, each successive seventh day was to be observed; for, said Jesus, “The Sabbath was made for man.” Mark 2:27, 28. The Sabbath as the memorial of creation keeps ever present the true reason why worship is due to God. It is because He is our Creator, and we are His creatures. It lies at the very foundation of divine worship; for it teaches this great truth in the most impressive manner, and no other institution does this. So long as the fact that God is our Creator continues to be a reason why we should worship Him, so long will the seventh day continue as a memorial of His creative power, that power that supplies our spiritual and physical needs. Our Creator has given us the Sabbath as a sign, that we may know that it is the Lord our God that sanctifies us; that it is He who creates in us a clean heart. Eze. 20:12, 20; Ps. 51:10; Eph. 2:10. The keeping of the Sabbath is a sign of loyalty to the true God; and had it always been kept as the memorial of the created works of Him who alone can create, there would never have been an idolater on the earth. We are to “worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” Rev. 14:7. The same power that created the earth, sea, and fountains of waters, creates a new heart in man. He who keeps the Sabbath, instituted at creation, keeps it not only as a memorial of the physical creation, but also as a sign that there has been created in him a new heart. Without this change of heart, no man can keep the Sabbath. The fourth commandment of the moral law requires us to work six days and rest on the seventh. It reads: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work: . . . for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” In this commandment, the times for labor and rest are separated, each set apart for its purpose. Now without motion, there can be no measurement of time. The diurnal revolution of the earth measures the day, the beginning and ending of which is marked by sunset. “From even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath.” Lev. 23:32. “At even, when the sun did set, they brought unto Him all that were diseased.” Mark 1:32. These texts simply show when the day begins and ends. It extends from even to even, or from sunset to sunset. Now if a change of the Sabbath should be made from the seventh to the first day of the week, it would subvert the order of things instituted at the beginning and commanded at Mt. Sinai. To effect such a change, one would have to work seven days and rest the first day of the following week, or work but five days and rest two days, either of which would be contrary to God’s established plan for labor and rest. He has sanctified — set apart — every seventh revolution of our globe to be observed as holy time, and has commanded that no unnecessary manual labor shall be done during the time measured by this diurnal revolution. Even after the earth is restored to its primitive, Edenic condition, the seventh-day Sabbath will be observed as the day for worship. We read: “For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before Me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before Me, saith the Lord.” Isa. 66:22, 23. The Sabbath upon which the redeemed will convene for worship in the earth renewed, is the very day that was instituted at the close of creation’s week. We can rest assured that it was not changed, at the resurrection of Christ, to the first day, to be changed back again to the seventh day, as the day for worship in the world to come, and this by the “Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” Our heavenly Father is not a changeable, unfaithful God. We read in Deut. 7:9, “Know therefore that the Lord thy God, He is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love Him and keep His commandments to a thousand generations.” From this scripture, we learn that the covenant of God’s mercy is extended to those who keep His commandments to a thousand generations. These commandments, spoken by God, and written with His divine finger upon tables of stone, include the seventh-day Sabbath. This conditional promise of God’s attendant mercy to commandment-keepers was given six hundred years after the birth of Abraham. There were forty-two generations from Abraham to Christ. Matt. 1:17. These forty-two generations covered a period of 2,056 years. Now allowing twenty-five years for a generation this side of Christ (which is a very fair estimate), to cover the period of nearly two thousand years, it gives us eighty generations from A.D. 1. Adding the eighty to the forty-two generations from Abraham to Christ we have 122 generations from Abraham to our days. Deducting 122 from the one thousand generations in which5the commandments are to be kept, we have 878 generations at least left us in which the Sabbath is still binding upon men. But the “thousand generations” is only another expression for eternity. As surely as our earth revolves, and thereby measures her days, so surely is each successive seventh day under divine appointment for rest and worship. Who will obey the mandates of the faithful, unchangeable God?